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Category: Maine

Stonington to Isle au Haut

Stonington to Isle au Haut

Acadia National Park

We like to go off the beaten path, so it’s only natural that we would go to Duck Harbor Campground.  It’s a primitive, remote campground on the sparsely populated island of Isle au Haut, and boasts hiking trails, bogs, and mountains to explore.  About half of the island is part of Acadia National Park.  What’s not to like? Our journey to Isle au Haut began in Bar Harbor, where we had just gone kayaking and checked out of Blackwoods Campground.  We headed…

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Kayaking West Side MDI

Kayaking West Side MDI

Acadia National Park

We waffled a bit on whether or not to go kayaking, but only because there’s so much to do in Acadia.  We decided to in the end because we wanted more practice as we plan to kayak at many other parks.  It gave our legs a rest from hiking, provided great views, and was our closest look at some wildlife.  We learned a lot about the park through this experience.  None of the water surrounding Acadia is actually part of…

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Pemetic Mountain Northwest Trail

Pemetic Mountain Northwest Trail

Acadia National Park

We started off our third day in Acadia with another iconic hike – Pemetic Mountain. Located on the east side of Mount Desert Island, right near Jordan Pond. There are four trail options to the Pemetic summit, and the northwest path (4.2 miles) seemed most interesting to us. The previous day, we hiked the Beehive, which features iron rungs and a small iron bridge. Pemetic has its own unique obstacles – ladders – which sounded fun. We’ll check out another…

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Ocean Path & Beehive Trails

Ocean Path & Beehive Trails

Acadia National Park

There are a lot of trails in Acadia. Since we were only there for 10 days, we wouldn’t have time to hike them all. For our first “major” hike, we decided to combine two very different hikes into a single trip – Ocean Path & The Beehive. You could easily do the hikes individually, but we wanted more of a challenge. The hikes are on the eastern side of Mount Desert Island, only 6 miles from Bar Harbor. Ocean Path…

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Carriage Roads, Bridges, and Jordan Pond House

Carriage Roads, Bridges, and Jordan Pond House

Acadia National Park

The well-known philanthropist John D. Rockefeller, Jr. made many significant contributions to the landscape of Acadia National Park; one was a system of carriage roads along with 17 unique bridges for visitors to enjoy. Our national parks need more people like that! Carriage roads and hiking trails weave together to provide a variety of routes to explore the rivers and bridges on the East side of the park (Schoodic also has a newly-built network of “carriage roads”). Due to time…

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Blackwoods Campground

Blackwoods Campground

Acadia National Park

The first night in Acadia, we stayed at the Quality Inn in Bar Harbor (which we highly recommend!). But we were excited about staying in a more rustic spot: Blackwoods Campground. Blackwoods is one of four campgrounds in Acadia, and it’s the only one on the east side of Mt. Desert Island. Thankfully, it was easy to find as we drove on Park Loop Road, and it’s only 5 miles from Bar Harbor. On our drive to the campground, we…

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Bar Harbor & Bar Island Trail

Bar Harbor & Bar Island Trail

Acadia National Park

What’s the first thing you do after flying to Bangor, renting a car, driving to Bar Harbor, and then checking into your hotel? For us the answer was obvious: Take a hike on Bar Island, then explore Bar Harbor in search of great food. We visited Bar Harbor numerous times over the course of our trip; this post catalogs our adventures there. Bar Island Trail Bar Island, north of Bar Harbor, is part of Acadia National Park. If you find…

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Overview & Trip Planning Summer 2016

Overview & Trip Planning Summer 2016

Acadia National Park

[Note: This is a detailed post about our research, itinerary, and planning for our trip to Acadia. If you’re more interested in our experiences and stories in Acadia, skip to any other Acadia post. Thanks!] We don’t like lobster. Normally, we would jump at the chance to try any local or regional delicacy. During our trip to Maine, we did have plenty of blueberries, fish, maple candy, and other tasty local treats. But we didn’t go to Maine solely for…

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